FG FINE ART LTD
Jacopo della Pila
Naples, documented from 1471 to 1502
This refined female figure in the round, identifiable as a personification of Prudence thanks to the iconographic attribute of the serpent, is a work by the sculptor Jacopo della Pila da Milano, a master marble sculpture documented in Naples between 1471 and 1502.
His fine execution technique and the still late-Gothic grace of his models, but above all his ability to propose artistic typologies in line with the fashion of the time, allowed Jacopo della Pila to become one of the most prolific and appreciated artists by the feudal nobility of the ancient Southern Kingdom, and to receive commissions from King Ferrante of Aragon for some fountains intended for the park of Castel Nuovo (doc. 1473; lost) and for the monumental Eucharistic tabernacle of the Palatine Chapel (doc. 1481).
Prucence
1473-1475 c.
Statuary marble, 99 cm high
PROVENANCE
Naples, church of San Domenico Maggiore (?)
Florence, Enrico Testa
Florence, Galleria Ciardiello, 23 May -1 June 1932, lot 482
Florence, Achille de Clemente
Florence, Galleria Ciardiello, 29 April - 3 May 1935, lot 136
Florence, Salvatore e Francesco Romano, 1962
Milan, Sotheby’s 12 April 1991, lot 425
Florence, Salvatore e Francesco Romano
Florence, Sotheby’s, 12-15 October 2009, lot 32
Milan, Sotheby’s, 25 September 2025, lot 8
BIBLIOGRAFIA
Catalogo della raccolta di arte antica appartenente al noto antiquario Enrico Testa che viene venduta all’asta pubblica per definitivo ritiro dal commercio, Florence, Galleria Ciardiello, 23 maggio - 1 giugno 1932, p. 36, lot 482, tav. XV
Catalogo della collezione De Clemente. Palazzo Ricasoli Firidolfi, Firenze. Oggetti di sola arte antica: quadri, sculture, bronzi, mobili, maioliche italiane, ecc. ecc., Florence, Galleria Ciardiello, 29 aprile - 3 maggio 1935, p. 21, lot 136
A. Dentamaro, Ricerche su Jacopo della Pila e i suoi committenti, master’s thesis, supervisor F. Caglioti, Università degli Studi “Federico II”, Naples 2011, pp. 40-50
A. Dentamaro, Qualche novità su Jacopo della Pila, con una digressione su alcune sculture napoletane nel Victoria and Albert Museum, in «Prospettiva», p. 130, appendix II, n. 4, e p. 140, note 79
It is reasonable to believe that our Prudence was part of a triad of Cardinal Virtues placed to support a sarcophagus, and this circumstance seems to be confirmed by its collection history, partly shared with a Temperance, now belonging to a private Italian collection. The two statues, perfectly consistent in size, state of preservation, and style, reappeared on the antiques market in 1932, with a generic reference to early 15th-century Tuscan art, on the occasion of the sale of the collection of ancient art belonging to the antique dealer Enrico Testa and curated by the Ciardiello Gallery of Florence. A few years later, in 1935, the caryatids appeared in the sale of the collection of Achille De Clemente, curated by the same Ciardiello Gallery. In the catalogue for this second auction, the sculptures, compared to the corresponding Virtues from the Triumphal Arch of Castel Nuovo in Naples, were assigned two distinct and unequivocal attributions: Francesco Laurana for Temperance; Isaia da Pisa for Prudence, an attribution that also persisted in the most recent sale at Sotheby’s Milan. In specialist studies, these attributions were corrected in 2010, when the statues were returned to Jacopo della Pila by Francesco Caglioti.
Compared to statues similar in iconography, our Prudence stands out for its absolutely original features, primarily regarding the position of the arms and the shape of the low-cut cloak in the “antique” style, which seem inspired by some Roman figure not too distant from the so-called Piccola Ercolanese type. This type takes its name from the example in the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen in Dresden (inv. Hm 327), which was found in the ancient theatre of Herculaneum, and constitutes one of the most widespread types of classical statuary in the ancient world and most appreciated by Renaissance artists. In Jacopo della Pila’s version, however, the figure does not use her hands to support the edges of the cloak, but uses them to display her symbols: the book and the serpent. Even the gesture of the right arm does not reach the accentuated diagonal bend that distinguishes the Piccola Ercolanese, but is closer to that of a variant similar to the Antonia in the Louvre Museum (inv. MNE 812). Before Jacopo della Pila, Isaia da Pisa had also begun from the study of a similar model to sculpt a Prudence within a niche intended for the (destroyed) tomb of Antonio Martinez de Chavez (c. 1448-1450), cardinal of Portugal, in the Basilica of St. John Lateran.
Although the collection history of our Prudence prior to 1932 is unknown, it is possible to advance a reasonable hypothesis regarding its origins.
he possible provenance of Prudence (and also of Temperance, now in private collection) could be identified in the monument by Nicola Tomacelli . The Neapolitan nobleman, advisor to Ferrante d’Aragona, died prematurely in 1473, when his wife Caterina Beccadelli de Bononia, daughter of the famous humanist Antonio (known as the) Panormita and Laura Arcella, had a tomb erected in the church of San Domenico Maggiore, where since the mid-fourteenth century the Tomacelli family had owned the chapel dedicated to Saint Catherine of Alexandria. Of this tomb, which also probably followed the typology of the coffin-shaped sarcophagus placed on caryatids (with or without a canopy), only two fragments survive on site, walled into the southern wall of the chapel. The gisant in military garb was correctly attributed to Jacopo della Pila in 1960 by Helmut Leppien, who recognized the Lombard sculptor’s style and technique, particularly in the deceased’s face, which resembles the “portraits” of Giovanni and Diego Cavaniglia and Giulio Barattuccio. The sarcophagus’s front, previously believed by Leppien to be a 14th-century relic, may instead, according to a recent interpretation, be a work created in the second half of the 15th century, reproducing a more antique model.
Passed by inheritance to the Ruffo family, Dukes of Bagnara, the chapel of Santa Caterina underwent two renovations. The first in 1591, documented by a lost inscription, but recorded in Cesare d’Engenio Caracciolo’s 1623 sacred guide, and by several payments to the painter Curzio de Giorgio and the gilder Giovan Domenico Bonocore. On the same occasion, the painter Giovan Angelo d’Amato created the altarpiece with the Martyrdom of Saint Catherine of Alexandria. The second and more significant renovation took place in 1796, and is attested by the epigraph inscribed on a tomb cover still visible in the chapel’s floor. The altar and the polychrome marble aedicule date back to this second intervention, promoted by Ippolita Ruffo (†1830). The insertion of the new furnishings into the chapel had to involve the dismantling of Nicholas’ monument, which had become too heavy and protruding for the relatively limited space. Consequently, it was decided to save the elements representing the physical body (gisant) and the family bond between the living and the dead (the front of the coffin with noble coats of arms and a dedicatory inscription). The caryatids, which with a few adjustments could appear as complete statues, had to be transferred to another location, to then end up in some private collection and from there pass onto the antiques market.
A full fact sheet is available on request.
